How to conform goat cheese.

I really do my best to avoid controversial subjects. I dabble in them occasionally, but do my best to not stay long enough to get things too stirred up. I seem to have hit one of those subjects, and I felt that it warranted a little bit more than what it was currently getting.

So, last night on a friends personal page they made mention of something, I replied to it, and a handful of other people did as well. One person started making tons of replies. In the end she probably had 100+ comments. She belittled everyone who disagreed with her. She used a term with me that I had never heard of before and was forced to google it. Come to find out it was a slang word. She was essential telling me to "eff off". I decided that instead of engaging this kind of person I was going to just tap out and not say anything.

Around comment 120+ or so I finally commented again. I had seen that in previous comments out of nowhere the "odd duck" would say things like "I have autism", "I have the aspergers autism" "I have an IQ of 170"....All of these comments were ignored by the person she was currently verbally assaulting. He ignored them because they had nothing to do with what they were talking about, and he consistently did not talk to her in the same tone as which she was talking to him in. My comment, was directed specifically at my friend, and did not mention this other person or anything from her conversation with the other person.

She then latched on to me. I replied with just "I wasn't talking to you". She then began to inform me that it didn't matter and went on a tangent. I said "That has nothing to do with what I said". She then informed me that well at least the other person had been intelligent and that I was being very rude and hello...she has autism.

Now, this really got under my skin. This person was being a total jerk to everyone and then saying they have autism to keep people from being mean back to her. She very clearly knew she was being a jerk, and abusing her "disability".

*Insert rant/convo from Tylerism's*

Ok. So here is why it bugs me. I have to fight for Tyler to get services. Services that he needs just to get his class work done. It makes it all the more harder for me to throw the word autism around for why he needs services when people are out there using it as a reason for them to get by with being a total butt to the general public. I make my son apologize for saying things he shouldn't. You know, those truthful observations that you really shouldn't say. I teach him that even though they are true that you shouldn't say them anyways. Calling people names and picking fights for no reason has nothing to do with autism. Calling people names is not those factual truths that you shouldn't say.

"Your child has to learn to conform". This is something that has been known to get under my skin. Why? I don't know. That pesky little word "conform" does it every time though. Why? Why does he have to conform? Why can't the public at large learn to deal with it? Here's the thing. He doesn't have to lose himself in order to conform. No one (better not be) is asking him to stop being Tyler. However, you can't do certain things. As I look around my house, as I look at my husband and myself... We are living our very quirky lives, and we conform where need be. My husband works from home, and he doesn't tell the people he's forced to talk to just how stupid he thinks they are.

We teach our kids that you can't do those things. We teach our kids that they are MORE than autism. We teach our kids not to hide behind their diagnosis. To go out there and BE something. To rise and triumph. To, dare I say, CONQUER it. And in order for our children to do these things, the adults have to stop using it as an excuse. It is NOT ok or a symptom of autism to call people names. It is not ok or a symptom of autism to use it as a shield to see to it that you do not receive the same treatment that you dish out. Those are very deliberate actions. Actions that are not acceptable.

In the big picture I do not care about anything this woman had said. I do not know this lady. And once this conversation dies away that will be the end of it for me. What I care about is people (she's not the only one) who water the word autism down - who only make it harder on the community. On top of it making it harder for everyone in the community what kind of awareness do you think that message is sending? If the other people in that conversation didn't know what autism was...what do you think they learned about it from this woman's behavior?

I have autism, so I'm not so good with people. I have autism, so I have to work a little harder at it than others. I have autism, so I find it hard to picture things in my head that I can't see in front of me. I have autism, it does not have me. This is the message I teach Tyler. I do not ever make it ok to say: I can't do that, I have autism. You're stupid, I have autism.

As I sit here thinking about new modifications that Tyler needs in his IEP, I can't help but wonder how much damage bad advertisement does for our community. We all want progress. We all want better services. We all want a way for our kids to learn how to rise to the occasion. We can't do that if the message is: Autism is a free ride. No one wants to give services for that. No one is saying that you can't have autism and be the person you are, just that you can't have autism and use it as an excuse for bad behavior. Especially once you're an adult, but that is a lesson learned in childhood.

Here is a link to an article shared to us in the above linked conversation. It's a good read, and she probably says it better than I do.